by many
people. As such its efficacy seems to me to be altogether magical, in
the best sense of that word.

(1) As "ELIPHAS LEVI" well says: "Superstition... is the sign surviving
the thought; it is the dead body of a religious rite." (_Op cit_., p.
150.)

But, indeed, I think a still wider application of the word "magic" is
possible. "All experience is magic," says NOVALIS (1772-1801), "and
only magically explicable";(2a) and again: "It is only because of the
feebleness of our perceptions and activity that we do not perceive
ourselves to be in a fairy world." No doubt it will be objected that the
common experiences of daily life are "natural," whereas magic postulates
the "supernatural". If, as is frequently done, we use the term
"natural," as relating exclusively to the physical realm, then, indeed,
we may well speak of magic as "supernatural," because its aims are
psychical. On the other hand, the term "natural" is sometimes employed
as referring to the whole realm of order, and in this sense one can use
the word "magic" as descriptive of Nature herself when viewed in the
light of an idealistic philosophy, such as that of SWEDENBORG, in which
all causation is seen to be essentially spiritual, the things of this
world being envisaged as symbols of ideas or spiritual verities, and
thus physical causation regarded as an appearance produced in virtue of
the magical, non-causal efficacy of symbols.(1) Says CORNELIUS AGRIPPA:
"... every day some natural thing is drawn by art and some divine
thing is drawn by Nature which, the Egyptians, seeing, called Nature a
Magicianess (_i.e_.) the very Magical power itself, in the attracting of
like by like, and of suitable things by suitable."(2)

(2a) NOVALIS: _Schriften_ (ed. by LUDWIG TIECK and FR. SCHLEGEL, 1805),
vol. ii. p. 195

(1) For a discussion of the essentially magical character of inductive
reasoning, see my _The Magic of Experience_ (1915)

(2) _Op. cit_., bk. i. chap. xxxvii. p. 119.

I would suggest, in conclusion, that there is nothing really opposed
to the spirit of modern science in the thesis that "all experience
is magic, and only magically explicable." Science does not pretend
to reveal the fundamental or underlying cause of phenomena, does
not pretend to answer the final Why? This is rather the business
of philosophy, though, in thus distinguishing between science and
philosophy, I am far from insinuating that philosophy should be
otherwise tha